Complete Works of Harriet Beecher Stowe
Page 696
The extracts have been taken from the papers of the more Southern States. If, now, the reader has any curiosity to explore the selecting process in the Northern States, the daily prints will further enlighten him. In the Daily Virginian of November 19th, 1852, Mr. J. B. McLendon thus announces to the Old Dominion that he has settled himself down to attend to the selecting process:
NEGROES WANTED.
The subscriber, having located in Lynchburg, is giving the highest cash prices for negroes between the ages of 10 and 30 years. Those having negroes for sale may find it to their interest to call on him at the Washington Hotel, Lynchburg, or address him by letter.
All communications will receive prompt attention.
Nov. 5. — dly. J. B. MC LENDON.
Mr. McLendon distinctly announces that he is not going to take any children under ten of years age, nor any grown people over thirty. Likely young negroes are what he is after: — families, of course, never separated!
Again, in the same paper, Mr. Seth Woodroof is desirous of keeping up the recollection in the community that he also is in the market, as it would appear he has been some time past. He, likewise, wants negroes between ten and thirty years of age; but his views turn rather on mechanics, blacksmiths, and carpenters — witness his hand:
NEGROES WANTED.
The subscriber continues in market for Negroes, of both sexes, between the ages of 10 and 30 years, including Mechanics, such as Blacksmiths, Carpenters, and will pay the highest market prices in cash. His office is a newly-erected brick building on 1st or Lynch-street, immediately in rear of the Farmers’ Bank, where he is prepared (having erected buildings with that view) to board negroes sent to Lynchburg for sale, or otherwise, on as moderate terms, and keep them as secure, as if they were placed in the jail of the Corporation.
Aug. 26. SETH WOODROOF.
There is no manner of doubt that this Mr. Seth Woodroof is a gentleman of humanity, and wishes to avoid the separation of families as much as possible. Doubtless he ardently wishes that all his blacksmiths and carpenters would be considerate, and never have any children under ten years of age; but, if the thoughtless dogs have got them, what’s a humane man to do? He has to fill out Mr. This, That, and the Other’s order — that’s a clear case; and therefore John and Sam must take their last look at their babies, as Uncle Tom did of his when he stood by the rough trundle bed and dropped into it great, useless tears.
Nay, my friends, don’t curse poor Mr. Seth Woodroof, because he does the horrible, loathsome work of tearing up the living human heart, to make twine and shoe-strings for you! It’s disagreeable business enough, he will tell you, sometimes; and, if you must have him to do it for you, treat him civilly, and don’t pretend that you are any better than he.
But the good trade is not confined to the Old Dominion, by any means. See the following extract from a Tennessee paper, the Nashville Gazette, November 23rd, 1852, where Mr. A. A. McLean, general agent in this kind of business, thus makes known his wants and intentions:
WANTED.
I want to purchase immediately twenty-five likely NEGROES — male and female — between the ages of 15 and 25 years; for which I will pay the highest price in cash.
A. A. MC LEAN, General Agent, Cherry Street.
Nov. 9.
Mr. McLean, it seems, only wants those between the ages of fifteen and twenty-five. This advertisement is twice repeated in the same paper, from which fact we may conjecture that the gentleman is very much in earnest in his wants, and entertains rather confident expectations that somebody will be willing to sell. Further, the same gentleman states another want.
WANTED.
I want to purchase, immediately, a Negro man, Carpenter, and will give a good price.
Sept. 29. A. A. MC LEAN, Gen’l Agent.
Mr. McLean does not advertise for his wife and children, or where this same carpenter is to be sent — whether to the New Orleans market, or up the Red River, or off to some far bayou of the Mississippi, never to look upon wife or child again. But, again, Mr. McLean in the same paper tells us of another want:
WANTED IMMEDIATELY.
A Wet Nurse. Any price will be given for one of good character, constitution, &c. Apply to
A. A. MC LEAN, Gen’l Agent.
And what is to be done with the baby of this wet nurse? Perhaps, at the moment that Mr. McLean is advertising for her, she is hushing the little thing in her bosom, and thinking, as many another mother has done, that it is about the brightest, prettiest little baby that ever was born; for, singularly enough, even black mothers do fall into this delusion sometimes. No matter for all this — she is wanted for a wet nurse! Aunt Prue can take her baby, and raise it on corn-cake, and what not. Off with her to Mr. McLean!
See, also, the following advertisement of the good State of Alabama, which shows how the trade is thriving there. Mr. S. N. Brown, in the Advertiser and Gazette, Montgomery, Alabama, holds forth as follows:
NEGROES FOR SALE.
S. N. BROWN takes this method of informing his old patrons, and others waiting to purchase Slaves, that he has now on hand, of his own selection and purchasing, a lot of likely young Negroes, consisting of Men, Boys, and Women, Field Hands, and superior House Servants, which he offers and will sell as low as the times will warrant. Office on Market-street, above the Montgomery Hall, at Lindsay’s Old Stand, where he intends to keep slaves for sale on his own account, and not on commission; therefore thinks he can give satisfaction to those who patronized him.
Montgomery, Ala., Sept. 13, 1852. twtf (J.)
Where were these boys and girls of Mr. Brown selected? let us ask. How did their fathers and mothers feel when they were “selected?” Emmeline was taken out of one family, and George out of another. The judicious trader has travelled through wide regions of country, leaving in his track wailing and anguish. A little incident, which has recently been the rounds of the papers, may perhaps illustrate some of the scenes he has occasioned:
INCIDENT OF SLAVERY.
A negro woman belonging to Geo. M. Garrison, of Polk Co., killed four of her children, by cutting their throats while they were asleep, on Thursday night, the 2nd instant, and then put an end to her own existence by cutting her throat. Her master knows of no cause for the horrid act, unless it be that she heard him speak of selling her and two of her children, and keeping the others.
The uncertainty of the master in this case is edifying. He knows that negroes cannot be expected to have the feelings of cultivated people; and yet, here is a case where the creature really acts unaccountably, and he can’t think of any cause except that he was going to sell her from her children.
But, compose yourself, dear reader; there was no great harm done. These were all poor people’s children, and some of them, though not all, were black; and that makes all the difference in the world, you know!
But Mr. Brown is not alone in Montgomery. Mr. J. W. Lindsey wishes to remind the people of his depot.
ONE HUNDRED NEGROES FOR SALE,
At my depot, on Commerce-street, immediately between the Exchange Hotel and F. M. Gilmer, Jr.’s Warehouse, where I will be receiving, from time to time, large lots of Negroes during the season, and will sell on as accommodating terms as any house in this city. I would respectfully request my old customers and friends to call and examine my stock.
Montgomery, Nov. 2, 1852. JNO. W. LINDSEY.
Mr. Lindsey is going to be receiving, from time to time, all the season, and will sell as cheap as anybody; so there’s no fear of the supply falling off. And, lo! in the same paper, Messrs. Sanders & Foster press their claims also on the public notice.
NEGROES FOR SALE.
The undersigned have bought out the well-known establishment of Eckles and Brown, where they have now on hand a large lot of likely young Negroes, to wit: Men, Women, Boys and Girls, good field-hands. Also, several good House Servants and Mechanics of all kinds. The Subscribers intend to keep constantly on hand a large assortment of Negroes, comprising every
description. Persons wishing to purchase will find it much to their interest to call and examine previous to buying elsewhere.
April 13. SANDERS & FOSTER.
Messrs. Sanders & Foster are going to have an assortment also. All their negroes are to be young and likely; the trashy old fathers and mothers are all thrown aside like a heap of pigweed, after one has been weeding a garden.
Query: Are these Messrs. Sanders & Foster, and J. W. Lindsey, and S. N. Brown, and McLean, and Woodroof, and McLendon, all members of the church, in good and regular standing? Does the question shock you? Why so? Why should they not be? The Rev. Dr. Smylie, of Mississippi, in a document endorsed by two Presbyteries, says distinctly that the Bible gives a right to buy and sell slaves.*
If the Bible guarantees this right, and sanctions this trade, why should it shock you to see the slave-trader at the communion-table? Do you feel that there is blood on his hands — the blood of human hearts, which he has torn asunder? Do you shudder when he touches the communion-bread, and when he drinks the cup which “whosoever drinketh unworthily drinketh damnation to himself?” But who makes the trade? Do not you? Do you think that the trader’s profession is a healthy one for the soul? Do you think the scenes with which he must be familiar, and the deeds he must do, in order to keep up an assortment of negroes for your convenience, are such things as Jesus Christ approves? Do you think they tend to promote his growth in grace, and to secure his soul’s salvation? Or is it so important for you to have assorted negroes that the traders must not only be turned out of good society in this life, but run the risk of going to hell for ever, for your accommodation?
But let us search the Southern papers, and see if we cannot find some evidence of that humanity which avoids the separation of families, as far as possible. In the Argus, published at Weston, Missouri, Nov. 5, 1852, see the following:
A NEGRO FOR SALE.
I wish to sell a black girl, about 24 years old, a good cook and washer, handy with a needle, can spin and weave. I wish to sell her in the neighbourhood of Camden Point; if not sold there in a short time, I will hunt the best market; or I will trade her for two small ones, a boy and girl.
M. DOYAL.
Considerate Mr. Doyal! He is opposed to the separation of families, and, therefore, wishes to sell this woman in the neighbourhood of Camden Point, where her family ties are — perhaps her husband and children, her brothers or sisters. He will not separate her from her family if it is possible to avoid it; that is to say, if he can get as much for her without; but, if he can’t, he will “hunt the best market.” What more would you have of Mr. Doyal?
How speeds the blessed trade in the State of Maryland? — Let us take the Baltimore Sun of Nov. 23, 1852.
Mr. J. S. Donovan thus advertises the Christian public of the accommodations of his jail:
CASH FOR NEGROES.
The undersigned continues, at his old stand, No. 13, CAMDEN ST., to pay the highest price for NEGROES. Persons bringing Negroes by railroad or steamboat will find it very convenient to secure their Negroes, as my Jail is adjoining the Railroad Depot and near the Steamboat Landings. Negroes received for safe keeping.
J. S. DONOVAN.
Messrs. B. M. and W. L. Campbell, in the respectable old stand of Slatter, advertise as follows: —
SLAVES WANTED.
We are at all times purchasing SLAVES, paying the highest cash prices. Persons wishing to sell will please call at 242, Pratt St. (Slatter’s old stand.) Communications attended to.
B. M. & W. L. CAMPBELL.
In another column, however, Mr. John Denning has his season advertisement, in terms which border on the sublime:
FIVE THOUSAND NEGROES WANTED.
I will pay the highest prices, in cash, for 5000 NEGROES, with good titles, slaves for life or for a term of years, in large or small families, or single negroes. I will also purchase negroes restricted to remain in the State, that sustain good characters. Families never separated. Persons having Slaves for sale will please call and see me, as I am always in the market with the cash. Communications promptly attended to, and liberal commissions paid, by JOHN N. DENNING, No. 18, S. Frederick-street, between Baltimore and Second streets, Baltimore, Maryland. Trees in front of the house.
Mr. John Denning, also, is a man of humanity. He never separates families. Don’t you see it in his advertisement? If a man offers him a wife without her husband, Mr. John Denning won’t buy her. Oh, no! His five thousand are all unbroken families; he never takes any other; and he transports them whole and entire. This is a comfort to reflect upon, certainly.
See, also, the Democrat, published in Cambridge, Maryland, Dec. 8, 1852. A gentleman thus proclaims to the slaveholders of Dorchester and adjacent counties that he is again in the market.
NEGROES WANTED.
I wish to inform the slaveholders of Dorchester and the adjacent counties that I am again in the Market. Persons having negroes that are slaves for life to dispose of will find it to their interest to see me before they sell, as I am determined to pay the highest prices in cash that the Southern market will justify. I can be found at A. Hall’s Hotel in Easton, where I will remain until the first day of July next. Communications addressed to me at Easton, or information given to Wm. Bell in Cambridge, will meet with prompt attention.
WM. HARKER.
Mr. Harker is very accommodating. He keeps himself informed as to the state of the Southern market, and will give the very highest price that it will justify. Moreover, he will be on hand till July, and will answer any letters from the adjoining county on the subject. On one point he ought to be spoken to. He has not advertised that he does not separate families. It is a mere matter of taste, to be sure; but then, some well-disposed people like to see it on a trader’s card, thinking it has a more creditable appearance; and, probably, Mr. Harker, if he reflects a little, will put it in next time. It takes up very little room, and makes a good appearance.
We are occasionally reminded, by the advertisements for runaways, to how small an extent it is found possible to avoid the separation of families; as in the Richmond Whig of Nov. 5, 1852.
TEN DOLLARS REWARD.
We are requested by Henry P. Davis to offer a reward of 10 dollars for the apprehension of a negro man named HENRY, who ran away from the said Davis’
farm near Petersburg, on Thursday, the 27th October. Said slave came from near Lynchburg, Va., purchased of — Cock, and has a wife in Halifax county, Va. He has recently been employed on the South Side Railroad. He may be in the neighbourhood of his wife.
PULLIAM & DAVIS, Aucts., Richmond.
It seems to strike the advertiser as possible that Henry may be in the neighbourhood of his wife. We should not at all wonder if he were.
The reader by this time is in possession of some of those statistics of which the South Carolinian speaks when he says: —
We feel confident, if statistics could be had to throw light upon the subject, we should find that there is less separation of families among the negroes than occurs with almost any other class of persons.
In order to give some little further idea of the extent to which this kind of property is continually changing hands, see the following calculation, which has been made from sixty-four Southern newspapers, taken very much at random. The papers were all published in the last two weeks of the month of November, 1852.
The negroes are advertised sometimes by name, sometimes in definite numbers, and sometimes in “lots,” “assortments,” and other indefinite terms. We present the result of this estimate, far as it must fall from a fair representation of the facts, in a tabular form.
Here is recorded, in only eleven papers, the sale of eight hundred and forty-nine slaves in two weeks in Virginia; the State where Mr. J. Thornton Randolph describes such an event as a separation of families being a thing that “we read of in novels sometimes.”
States where Published.
Number of Papers consulted.
Number of Negroes advertised.
Number of Runaways described.
Virginia84915
Kentucky2387
Tennessee38517
S. Carolina8527
Georgia98...
Alabama5495
Mississippi6696
Lousiana46035
4,10092
In South Carolina, where the writer in Fraser’s Magazine dates from, we have during these same two weeks a sale of eight hundred and fifty-two recorded by one dozen papers. Verily, we must apply to the newspapers of his State the same language which he applies to “Uncle Tom’s Cabin:” “Were our views of the system of slavery to be derived from these papers, we should regard the families of slaves as utterly unsettled and vagrant.”
The total, in sixty-four papers, in different States, for only two weeks, is four thousand one hundred, besides ninety-two lots, as they are called.
And, now, who is he who compares the hopeless, returnless separation of the negro from his family, to the voluntary separation of the freeman, whom necessary business interest takes for a while from the bosom of his family? Is not the lot of the slave bitter enough without this last of mockeries and worst of insults? Well may they say in their anguish, “Our soul is exceedingly filled with the scorning of them that are at ease, and with the contempt of the proud!”
From the poor negro, exposed to bitterest separation, the law jealously takes away the power of writing. For him the gulf of separation yawns black and hopeless, with no redeeming signal. Ignorant of geography, he knows not whither he is going, or where he is, or how to direct a letter. To all intents and purposes it is a separation hopeless as that of death, and as final.
CHAPTER IV.
THE SLAVE-TRADE.
WHAT is it that constitutes the vital force of the institution of slavery in this country? Slavery being an unnatural and unhealthful condition of society, being a most wasteful and impoverishing mode of cultivating the soil, would speedily run itself out in a community, and become so unprofitable as to fall into disuse, were it not kept alive by some unnatural process.